Belgian Prisons Crack Under Overcrowding Crisis

Belgium’s prison system is buckling under chronic overcrowding, with nearly 600 detainees sleeping on mattresses on cell floors and some sharing 9-square-metre cells three to a room. As of late September, the country held 13,434 detainees for just 10,795 available places, according to union figures reported by RTBF. Emergency government measures aimed at easing the pressure came into force on 1 October, but critics warn they fall short of a structural fix.

A Chronic and Worsening Problem

The floor-sleeper count reached 599 on 21 September, up 55 in a single week. While still below the spring 2026 record of nearly 780, it marked a renewed climb after the figure dipped to 482 in mid-January. The worst-affected establishments were Haren (157 floor-sleepers), Antwerp (68) and Hasselt (41).

“We see an increase both in the number of convicted persons and in those in pre-trial detention,” said Valérie Callebaut, spokesperson for Belgium’s prison establishments. The prison administration cites roughly 600 floor-sleepers, a figure that includes residents of transition and detention houses.

The strain is not new. Belgium’s prison population rose about 21 percent between 2023 and 2025, and occupancy stood at 118 percent at the time of the Council of Europe’s last inspection in May 2025.

“Three in 9m²”: Life Behind the Walls

Nowhere is the human cost clearer than in Namur. During a June heatwave, RTL Info documented cells designed for two people now holding three, with temperatures exceeding 40°C and no air conditioning.

“It’s horrible. At over 40 degrees in the cells, with three of us, we’re living a nightmare. Yes, we are prisoners. But they cannot leave us in these conditions, it’s inhumane,” a 44-year-old detainee told the broadcaster.

Prison officer Julien described how heat compounds the pressure: “Tensions rise much faster… locked up three to a 9-square-metre cell, with no air conditioning, it’s even worse.” Christophe, a first head of quarter, warned of worse to come: “If the population keeps climbing and we end up with 2,000 or 3,000 detainees on mattresses in Belgium, it will be unmanageable. It’s going to explode in the prisons.”

Council of Europe Sounds the Alarm

In September, the Council of Europe’s anti-torture committee (CPT) published a damning report based on May 2025 visits to prisons in Ghent, Haren, Marche-en-Famenne, Nivelles and Turnhout. It found that the prison population had grown nearly 4 percent since its visit, with the number of floor-sleepers more than doubling.

The committee said it was “struck” by an increase in allegations of ill-treatment—slaps, punches or kicks by staff during interventions, often in areas not covered by video surveillance. It reported that some detainees had less than 4 square metres of personal space, and that adequate mental-health and substance-use care was “impossible.”

The treatment of interned persons—mentally ill offenders held in prison for lack of psychiatric places—was described as “disastrous,” with very ill detainees left in cells soiled with faeces and urine. The CPT also found that minimum service was “rarely guaranteed” during strikes, with medical consultations and court hearings “frequently cancelled and postponed.” The findings were detailed in RTBF’s coverage of the report.

Government’s Emergency Measures

After months of political wrangling, a deal struck in March between Justice Minister Annelies Verlinden (CD&V) and MR deputy prime minister David Clarinval, brokered by Prime Minister Bart De Wever (N-VA), was approved by the Council of Ministers in May and passed by the Chamber in July.

The measures, green-lit by the government, took effect on 1 October. They include automatic electronic monitoring (ankle bracelets) for sentences up to 18 months through end-2028, accelerated removal of convicted persons without residence rights, and early release for overcrowding—extended to end-2027 but restricted to sentences of no more than three years. High-risk categories are excluded from the ankle-bracelet measure, and each file is reviewed by a sentence-enforcement judge, albeit only retrospectively.

As VRT NWS reported, Verlinden and the unions had pushed to extend early release to long-term prisoners up to 12 months before sentence end, but coalition partners blocked the move. Belgium’s sentence-enforcement courts have called the law an unprecedented attack on their independence, objecting that judicial oversight comes only after the fact.

A System That Fills as Fast as It Builds

Valérie Lebrun, director of Namur prison, argues that adding capacity alone cannot solve the problem. “The main response has always been to create more places. But as soon as they’re created, they’re almost immediately filled,” she said, pointing to over-use of pre-trial detention and a lack of alternatives for people with addiction or mental-health problems.

The political dimension has been just as fraught. At the start of the year, La Libre reported that Verlinden was facing a political storm, with the King publicly urging authorities to confront overcrowding and partners in the governing coalition sparring over rival fixes. The MR tied the prison dossier to its demand for military deployment against drug trafficking, while CD&V resisted, and the minister was separately dogged by conflict-of-interest questions over a prior legal role.

What’s Next

The coming months will test whether the emergency measures deliver measurable relief or merely pause an escalating crisis. Unions have staged repeated strikes—including a nationwide 24-hour walkout on 25 September—over overcrowding, unsanitary conditions and staff shortages. The CPT’s findings remain a standing rebuke, and its call to uphold dignity in detention has yet to be answered. With a structural shortage of psychiatric places, heavy reliance on pre-trial detention and a prison population that has grown for two decades, Belgium’s cell doors are unlikely to close on this problem anytime soon.